The Decision Coach on Ask a Manager!
I was interviewed on one of my absolute favorite advice columns on the internet, Ask A Manager! We talked about what a decision coach does, my most unusual decisions, and the decision-making advice I’d give everyone. Here are a few highlights:
So what exactly is a decision coach?
“A decision coach is someone who helps people make one big decision. I know this because I invented both this job and the title! I only offer one thing: a single session in which I coach someone who’s struggling with a big choice. So they come to me, I figure out the right decision for them, and then they can move forward. I think of myself as the person who makes a little stepstool with their hands so that someone can get up on the horse and ride away. And it’s incredibly fulfilling — hearing the sense of relief people have at the end of the call when the decision that’s been taking over their life has finally been made — it’s the best.”
What qualities do you think it takes to do this work well?
“You have to be a great active listener — someone who can really hear what a person is saying behind the actual words. You have to be attuned to what people really want, not what they say they want. And you have to be willing to give it to them straight. No waffling! I have to tell people stuff that’s hard to hear (telling people to end a relationship, for example, is always tough) and I have to do it in a nice way. Of course, I get to deliver lots of good news too, and I love telling people that the idea they’ve had is worth going for.
You also have to be friendly and warm, and able to put people at ease, which is something I’ve always been good at. We often laugh a lot in the sessions; people go from anxious to relaxed pretty quickly.”
I like that you offer just a single session. That must require you to figure out how to keep the time really structured and useful. How do you normally approach a session?
“The single session concept is very deliberate. By the time people get to me, they’ve already put in many, many hours of thinking and researching and wondering (and often boring their families and friends!). So they’re at the point where more talking and researching and wondering is a complete waste of time. In fact, they probably passed that point a while ago!
My job is to release people from this state of indecision by helping them actually make the choice and identifying next steps. (My motto is ‘your therapist won’t tell you what to do but I will.’) So I ask clients to do two exercises before the call, identifying values and thinking about their Future Selves. Then we have the session, which usually takes around one hour. I get a sense of the person’s whole life, from hobbies to pets, because most big decisions affect every aspect of your life. I ask a lot of questions about the decision itself. We review their values and the life they want to have. And over the course of the hour it always becomes clear to me what they should do — the choice that has the highest chance of making them happy. I share this with them, along with the reasons I came to that decision. And then we plan their next steps, because I like to make sure they get off the phone with a plan of action.”